Entertainment - Bollywood's priciest trio: Aamir, Akshay, SRK

Shubha Shetty - Saha

Aamir Khan, Akshay Kumar and Shah Rukh Khan: This trio of top-most grossers of Bollywood have laid down a rule -- apart from the signing amount (about Rs10-12 crore), they demand a share of the profits.

Their share sometimes goes up to almost 50%, depending on the production house. This rule obviously is not applicable when they are producing their own movies, as SRK and Aamir have also turned producers.

According to sources, Akshay managed to get as much as Rs41 crore from his last film Singh is Kingg alone. But even that seems minimal in comparison to what Aamir, who's currently leading the big-bucks race, managed to garner through Ghajini. Just two weeks after the release, according to trade pundits, Aamir has managed to already make a cool Rs35 crore.

"The net profit till now is calculated at Rs100 crore for the producers, so going by that figure even if Aamir had asked for a minimum of 35%, he would have made Rs35 crore till now. In fact, his share could be bigger too!" says trade analyst Amod Mehra.
Akshay, in an interview not too long ago, had said that asking for a share in IPR (Intellectual Property Rights) is the smartest thing to do.

"An actor has to understand, if he takes the risk, it pays better," he said. "If the business is good, you get more money -- but if the business is bad, you stay right there. A lot of people also go for negative rights, with a stake of 33 to 50%."

Similarly, even though Rab Ne Bana Di Jodi made good business (Rs90 crore in the first week itself), SRK might have opted for a lesser percentage from Yash Raj films considering that he has been loyal to the production company for a while now.

Salman Khan can perhaps demand almost as much, but in the last year he hasn't signed any fresh films except his home production, Veer, and an old commitment to Boney Kapoor.

Hrithik Roshan follows next. In fact, he is one of the first to have been offered an Rs30 crore deal by Adlabs. But right now that's only on paper and Hrithik has not signed any film apart from father Rakesh Roshan's, and one with Sanjay Leela Bhansali recently. After the fresh success of Dostana, John Abraham is said to be charging Rs7 crore, a bracket which Ajay Devgan and Sanjay Dutt also reportedly fall into, especially after the tidal wave of recession hit.